Here’s a tricolored heron with its breakfast:
I think the luckless critter that was on the menu is a frog; my husband suspects it’s a crawdad.
Fun facts about tricolored herons: the male builds a rough frame for the nest, and the female does the trim work, adding smaller sticks, grass, etc. IIRC, the plumage is the same for both sexes. The blue skin around the bill means he or she is ready for romance!
Open thread!
brendancalling
Beautiful sunny day, a little brisk in Nashville this morning. Bandmate/housemate still asleep with Strawberry his goofy dog. Drinking my last cuppa joe, getting cheap breakfast up the street, then a quick practice with a buddy who’s recording this week and then maybe seeing some metal bands tonight.
All in all, a good day so far.
Kelly
Moving this up from below.
Beto’s handle on the Cult of the Dead Cow was Psychedelic Warlord.
https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-politics-beto-orourke/
I suppose this sort of thing is to be expected from now on.
trollhattan
I think crawdad wins the loser competition (to my eye anyway). Nice that you can get relatively close, I have a hard time with wading birds, which seem very wary most of the time.
Mr Stagger Lee
St Patrick’s weekend, means The Boondock Saints in me household.
Origuy
@Kelly I wonder what George HW Bush’s name was in Skull and Bones.?
raven
Auburn Fla coming right up.
CaseyL
It would almost be worth putting up with the heat, humidity, and Giant Flying Cockroaches, to have so many gorgeous critters living around me like you do, Betty. Maybe if I hadn’t already done my time in Florida I’d consider it.
Not that Seattle’s urban evirons lacks for wild things. When I first moved here, seeing a raccoon was an exotic experience. Now I’m so used to them, I practically know their entire families. (And love seeing the babies make their debut appearances.) For birds we have Stellar Jays, woodpeckers, blue herons, eagles, geese and ducks by the truckload, coots (I love their weird pod-like toes) – and that’s in the city. Also used to be some peregrines nesting downtown; maybe still are.
ETA: Just checked and, no, the peregrines have been gone for a couple of years. They say Mom might have died and Dad left to find another mate.
trollhattan
Kid is off at a regional long distance track meet, trying to up her official 1600 meter time. Considering she barely trains (soccer gets in the way) she’s not bad at it, and for whatever reason colleges recruit track more than soccer. Perhaps because America has about ten million soccer girls at any given time.
Kelly
This Great Blue Heron is a resident at some ponds nearby. She’s tolerant of my photography. Her mate grumpily flys away before I get close. I have yet to get a good pic of her catching anything. Never has her head at a good angle.
https://imgur.com/a/SMazlUb
trollhattan
@CaseyL:
The Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta has the birdies and ZERO gators or pythons, in case you’re interested in becoming a river rat (what they call themselves). Also zero hurricanes but floods, well, houseboats don’t care.
rikyrah
Here is the video of Maddow explaining the spreadsheet of PREGNANT GIRLS in custody.???
I wanted to scream watching this.
https://youtu.be/FV_MAiHMgSI
Uncle Cosmo
@Kelly: 25 years ago I worked in the only office building in a waterfront development far northeast of the Baltimore beltway, with a window looking out onto one of the canals that webbed the area. For a few summers a pair of blue herons frequented that canal. I used to marvel at how ungainly those birds looked perched motionless on a pier piling scanning for a fishy meal in the depths – & how effortlessly they transformed into utter gracefulness as they burst into flight. One of the good memories of an otherwise challenging time.
rikyrah
Good ??
Jon Passantino (@passantino) Tweeted:
Murdoch’s Sky News Australia has been taken off the air in New Zealand after it broadcast the mosque shooter’s disturbing video of the attack https://t.co/MrHUbz8LFv https://twitter.com/passantino/status/1106695136098942976?s=17
Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho
Beautiful bird picture, Betty. Thanks very much.
I’m felled by the flu so Harry and I are going back to bed.
WaterGirl
@rikyrah: I literally thought I might throw up when I watched that. I have no words. Disgusting and appalling don’t even come close.
edit: others here have speculated that they might be tracking the periods so they can get girls pregnant and sell the babies. Without knowing what happens to the babies after the girls are illegally prohibited from getting abortions after they are raped, my first thought is that the guards are looking for “safe” times to rape the girls without them getting pregnant. If I am right, they are scheduling rapes.
edit 2: or am I conflating two different stories?
BruceFromOhio
Whenever I turn blue it means romance is over.
Kelly
@Uncle Cosmo: We also have little green herons that I see almost daily in the summer. Beautiful birds. I bought myself a Panasonic G85 and 45-150 zoom for Christmas. Planning to get some good shots this summer. We live in the Cascade foothills at the edge of the Willamette Valley along a river. Farms fields are transitioning to forest here. Diverse habitats, broad assortment of raptors bald eagles to tiny hawks.
sukabi
@CaseyL: if you haven’t already been and would like a good urban nature walk, lots of birds and small animals check out Forbes Creek Park in Kirkland.
Bald eagles, many kinds of ducks, herons, racoons, nutria…early morning and before sunset are best for the mammals…birds all day long.
WaterGirl
@Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho: I thought that today was supposed to be your “start to feel better day”. :-(
WaterGirl
@rikyrah: Please excuse me while I go bang my head against the wall.
Baud
Another example of right-wing Clinton-hating culture masquerading as left-wing virtue.
Betty Cracker
@Kelly: Nice heron!
Omnes Omnibus
@Baud: People like her?
waratah
@Baud: I think they feel that free speech gives them the right to be hateful.
Amir Khalid
@Baud:
I don’t Chelsea Clinton saying word one about the mosque shooting in New Zealand. From what was that line of attack dreamed up?
Omnes Omnibus
@waratah:
To be fair, it really does. OTOH, they should be aware that people will judge them.
Brickley Paiste
Sanders campaign workers unionize:
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.theroot.com/bernie-sanders-presidential-campaign-becomes-first-to-u-1833345170/amp
I don’t support Danders but credit given where credit due.
Unions are the least bad way for workers to protect their rights.
Betty Cracker
@Amir Khalid: The person who yelled at Chelsea Clinton was angry about comments Clinton made in the wake of the Rep. Omar anti-Semitism controversy. I saw a clip of it on Twitter. She (the student who confronted Clinton) screamed in Clinton’s face about her rhetoric being responsible for the murders. She came across as unhinged, IMO, but the most charitable interpretation is that she’s angry and scared and lashing out. Clinton was as gracious as a human being could possibly be under those circumstances.
Betty Cracker
Just saw that Mayor Pete has received enough donations to be eligible to appear in the first debate — hooray! I still think it’s awful that money is used as a metric for candidate seriousness. I understand it; that’s the shitty world we live in. But still, it rankles.
dmsilev
@Amir Khalid: The logic, such as it is, was that Clinton had tweeted something critical of Rep. Omar’s statements. Therefore, according to ‘logic’, any act of Islamaphobia can be blamed on a Clinton.
Amir Khalid
@Betty Cracker:
I see. Thanks.
Kelly
@Betty Cracker: Thanks! Yours is lovely as well. The photos around here are part of what inspired me to upgrade from smartphone snaps.
Baud
@Amir Khalid: Ironically, this was at a vigil for the NZ shooting. Talk about disrespect.
@Betty Cracker:
The standard is 1% in the polls OR a certain number of donators (not amounts) from a certain number of states. I don’t know how you make it more open than that.
Baud
@dmsilev:
Fixed.
Kelly
@Betty Cracker: Chelsea Clinton’s grace amazes me. I if I had grown up with my family under constant attack by nasty liars I would be a grumpy hermit.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Baud: if Jesse Waters or James O’Keefe were creating a character from rose twitter it would be those people yelling at Chelsea Clinton
Baud
@Kelly:
I didn’t and I am!
Amir Khalid
@Baud:
I knew there was a required minimum number of donors in there somewhere.
AnotherBruce
@CaseyL: There is a box under the West Seattle bridge. I have seen Peregrines nesting up on that box. It’s not every year, but I have seen this more than once. If you go to the lower bridge tower, Look west for a good look. I usually go there about late March and early April. But no guarantees, they are birds and they go wherever they want.
Amir Khalid
@Kelly:
Chelsea faced political attacks for being Bill and Hillary’s kid when she was twelve. That still boggles my mind.
Betty Cracker
Here’s an amazing anecdote about Mayor Pete Buttigieg:
[Link to Twitter]
Buttigieg continues to impress!
Betty Cracker
@Baud: Okay, number of donors then. Still, I wish it could be decoupled from money somehow. I get why it is but it still bugs me.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
I made a mistake taking up Spanish.
B.B.A.
Can we as a country just stop talking about the Clintons already? They’re about as relevant as the Bushes.
EDIT: Less, because a Bush still holds elective office somewhere.
Omnes Omnibus
@B.B.A.: I believe that Chelsea is over 35, so she is eligible to run for president.
germy
@Betty Cracker: She and her friend are fundraising.
debbie
@Baud:
“Right-wing bandwagon?” Goodbye, credibility.
Amir Khalid
@Omnes Omnibus:
If she ever shows the slightest interest in running for anything, I suppose she might run for that one.
Baud
@B.B.A.: If they are unfairly attacked, I intend to speak up.
Ladyraxterinok
@WaterGirl: I got the impression they monitored the periods to make sure they’d been pregnant long enuff that they could no longer get a legal abortion.
Also they continued this after the judge in the ACLU’s class action suit ruled that the govt/Trump administration was no longer legally able to prevent any of the girls in their custody getting an abortion
Omnes Omnibus
@Amir Khalid: My guess is that she would rather do DIY dental work than run for office.
germy
He lives in a gated mansion in Brazil, with servants and a half a million yearly salary.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
pretty good snark from an earnest good-government bureaucrat
Uncle Cosmo
@Betty Cracker: But was he speaking bokmål or nynorsk? :p
In summer 2000, not too long after the Russian submarine Kursk had gone down in the Arctic, I came into Oslo on the overnight train from Bergen & was rather groggily searching for the Braathens airline office (to buy a ticket for Trondheim) in the bowels of the station. I passed a newsstand on the way & glanced at the headline, which told me that (contrary to rumors) there had been no American submarine in the vicinity of the Kursk when it sank. Oh, I thought as I kept walking –
Then stopped & walked back. The paper was the Berlingske Tidende, one of the longest-running newspapers in the world. Published in Copenhagen. In Danish.**
I spoke (still speak) roughly a dozen words of Danish, atrociously. (Mainly Jeg forstår ikke dansk, taler De engelsk? [I don’t understand Danish, do you speak English?]) But (through some combination of grogginess & two years of German in college) I understood that headline. Go figger.
—-
** In retrospect, it might in fact been the Bergens Tidende, in Norwegian, of which I spoke/speak not a jot – bokmål or nynorsk.
cain
will their heads swivel left if they don’t like each other and swivel right if they do? Asking for a friend.
Omnes Omnibus
For the rugby fans around here. The England-Scotland match is a must see. I don’t want to offer up any spoilers for anyone who is recording it, so I will leave it there.
Baud
@germy: Trolls gotta troll.
cain
@Kelly:
At least we have someone who knows something about cybersecurity unlike everyone else. Having a president who was a hacker is fantastic. Because we are heading into those times.
Uncle Cosmo
@germy: One of these days the answer to “Where’s Greenwaldo?” may be In a Brazilian dumpster. Can’t come soon enough IMHO.
cain
@Betty Cracker:
I think we just found our Teddy Roosevelt. :)
The Pale Scot
60 seconds of people doing things at ridiculous skill levels
I thought I swung a mean sledgehammer back in the day. 20lb @ 1 swing every 5 seconds WOW
West of the Rockies
@Baud:
The NZ massacre is NOT Clinton’s fault, or Candace Owen’s. It belongs first and foremost to the shooter and to those who foment such rage and fear and resentment (which certainly does not include Chelsea Clinton).
Carlson, Limbaugh, Malkin, Coulter, Trump, Hannity, Owens, Milo… Step up to acknowledge your overt or tacit endorsement.
dww44
@Kelly: What did you upgrade to? I’m in the market to replace a Canon point and shoot that wasn’t old but inexplicably died. I’m not talented, but I am both a bird watcher and bird feeder in my neighborhood.
Unrelatedly, I’ve been over at the NYT reading the comments posted to Birch Bayh’s obituary and although I certainly am old enough to remember him well, I truly forgot how much he had actually accomplished as a Senator. I encourage all to go over and read his obit. . I also agree with commenter Joyce from San Francisco:
Baud
@West of the Rockies:
But I’ve already ordered 10,000 “I blame Chelsea” t-shirts.
dww44
@dww44: I don’t know why my link to the obit didn’t work:
Birch Bay dies at 91:
ljt
Just got text from daughter who is in NOLA to see Hamilton(!), where she and friends just met Stacy Abrams outside of hotel! She sent pic to prove it!
Kelly
@dww44: Panasonic GX85 with 12-32 and 45-150 zooms. Just under $500 package deal these days. I also bought a 25mm f1.7 prime. I’d been eyeing the advanced point and shoots with a 1″ sensor and noticed I could get this micro 4/3 camera with a somewhat bigger sensor and interchangeable lenses for the same or less money. The whole set is less than the wonderful Sony RX10 IV point and shoot. With a point and shoot I couldn’t decide which fixed lense I wanted. The 4/3 sensor is half of a full frame so at 150mm the zoom has the reach of a full frame 300mm.
Still figuring out how to use the settings quickly. Many photos where the twig in front of me is in perfect focus rather than the bird I wanted. Also I have protect it from the elements much more than my phone.
Suzanne
I am sitting in a hair salon with Olaplex on my head. Trying to do better at basic maintenance of the self, including getting haircuts and applying lotion regularly. When I’m stressed, that shit, along with sleep, is the first to go.
I am here for Kamala, Beto, and Mayor Pete right now, but am also getting excited for Stacey Abrams. After Christchurch, I am even more convinced that we do not need any OWGs who want to find “common ground” with the Nazi right.
Ninedragonspot
Listening to a fine “Falstaff” from the Met and afterwards prepping for Chinese karaoke tonight.
Have discovered I can use the Chelsea imbroglio as an indicator which of my friends will be gibbering idiots for the next 18 months.
Baud
@ljt:
Awesome for Miss ljt.
Chacal Charles Calthrop
@Kelly: you win the internets today
The Pale Scot
Plz delete my comment at 61, it doesn’t fit the thread.
Just fuck trumpovich,
karen marie
@West of the Rockies: The shooter credited Candace Owens. I will take him at his word.
StringOnAStick
Day 5 post knee replacement. The pain is declining enough that the boredom is becoming more prominent, while every action is an effort. I may consider hobbling outside for some sunshine when my husband gets home.
realbtl
@StringOnAStick: Boredom is a great motivator. I’m on day 18 and started driving 4 days ago. No more cabin fever.
JPL
@dww44: He does and the survival of Title IX alone shows how much he accomplished.
sgrAstar
@Betty Cracker: to be pedantic about it, it’s not the $ that the candidates raise, it’s the number of donors that gets them on the debate stage. Andrew Yang has also qualified. It’s gonna be epic!
J R in WV
@Brickley Paiste:
Also remarks about how swell it was for Sen. Sanders to unionize his campaign staff. Brick, you don’t understand how unionization works. Senator Sanders had to agree to the union, or lose his whole staff and end his campaign and grift way too early. Employers, like Sanders, don’t organize — their employees do, because they feel oppressed and taken advantage of.
This is a sign that even his closest staff doesn’t trust Senator Sanders as far as they can indivdually throw him!
StringOnAStick
@realbtl: Being able to drive again is going to be huge!
Barbara
@Baud: As if the killer and fellow travelers don’t hate Jews as much as they do Muslims. Even though, truth be told, I think the piling on of Omar was unjustified, and Chelsea Clinton, who is not a public figure, might have waited to get a better grasp of what was actually going on before chiming in with reflexive criticism. At any rate, once again, it turns out that Twitter isn’t really anyone’s friend.
J R in WV
@Kelly:
I got a Panasonic Lumix FZ200 super zoom point and shoot, because that bag full of Nikon hardware was an ordeal to lug around. Then I upgraded to their FZ1000, with a larger sensor, RAW image capability and a longer lens.
I gave the older Lumix to a neighbor who rebuilds antique musical instruments, who uses it to photograph tiny details of his workmanship to post on Facebook. He was amazed by how easy it was to use in macro mode.
Betty C has a Nikon Coolpix 900, which she is learning to use quite well, thank you V much. It’s very similar to the Lumix models, but Nikon didn’t have one like that when I went for the first Lumix FZ200, or I would have gotten one. I had a Nikon Coolpix back when they first came out, then graduated to a DSLR by Nikon, then went for the super zooms.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Barbara: I didn’t even know Chelsea Clinton had commented on Omar, and I regularly check out political twitter. I made the mistake of clicking on her name in the twitter trend thing. Apparently she’s not only a raging Islamaphobe she’s one of the most powerful people in the world!
Brachiator
@germy:
Ah, thanks for reminding me why I detest Greenwald.
eemom
I don’t know who Candace Owen is. I also don’t know who any of the actors starring in the college bribery scandal are. I wonder if these ignorances are related.
@Uncle Cosmo:
LOVE this. That creature has to be in the top five of most hypocritical hypocrites ever to walk the earth. Together with being obnoxious, smug, condescending, and utterly devoid of humor. He must be a blast at parties.
eemom
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I didn’t know Chelsea was Jewish! ?
FlipYrWhig
@germy: I like how Glenn Greenwald’s working definition of “elite” draws a circle just exactly so that a highly-educated creative-class expatriate with freely-flowing venture-capital funding is on the “Not It!” side. Convenient, innit?
I really, truly, deeply hate that guy.
Baud
@FlipYrWhig: No different than how Donald Trump became a champion of the working class.
rikyrah
@WaterGirl:
Why either/or.
Why not both/and?
Kelly
@J R in WV: FZ1000 was at the top of my list. I sorta planned to get an FZ1000 and another advanced 1″ point and shoot with a shorter, brighter lense. The GX85 set was a less expensive solution. The 25mm prime is great for indoor available light at the grandkids b-day parties and Christmas. The 12-32 is a good range for hiking and XC skiing trips and comfortable to have hanging around my neck. The 45-150 has pretty good reach for birds and such. Already starting to lust after the 100mm-300mm which would cost as much as my current outfit. I rarely take the whole bundle out but it’s acceptably compact when I do.
Still shoot a lot of pics with my phone. Quality is OK for anything close, it’s durable and it’s always within reach.
sukabi
@J R in WV: was most probably a way for female staffers to feel like their pay equity and sexual harrassment issues were actually addressed by the “too busy campaigning to address” senator.
Amir Khalid
@eemom:
Her husband is, so she’s a member of the secret Jewish cabal that rules the world. I think that’s supposed to be the argument.
rikyrah
@germy:
Thank you.
Thank you???
rikyrah
@StringOnAStick:
Keep on pushing. Do the therapy.???
FlipYrWhig
@Amir Khalid: I think the “argument,” such as it is, is that to the young “left” The Clintons are neoliberal neoconservative warmongering corporatists, ergo the symptom if not the source of all bad things in American life. Or at least that’s how the family figures in the legends of their people.
Barbara
@eemom: Her husband is Jewish. I don’t know whether she converted when they married. Also, I don’t know the college admission cheaters by name, except Mossimo (have a few tshirts from Target), but I can guess the net worth of the managing partner of Wilkie Farr.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@FlipYrWhig: this is from the heroic screamer’s twitter feed
doesn’t even explicitly!
and the tee-shirt she’s wearing in the video is from Wilmer’s campaign store
smintheus
Good news, nobody dead at the 9 alarm fire at a casket company in Boston. I would make a joke about this but it would DOA in any case.
FlipYrWhig
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I know know whether to blame Bernie Sanders or Twitter. Both appear to make people incredibly stupid.
ETA: Although maybe it’s more like that old joke about cocaine, that it makes you more of the person you already were.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@FlipYrWhig: heh, I like the idea of twitter as political cocaine
David Evans
@J R in WV: I have a Lumix FZ330 and, like your friend, am learning to use a Coolpix P900. They are both good in different ways. Obviously if you need the reach of the P900’s lens there’s nothing better, but the FZ330 has a clearer viewfinder and a faster lens and is easier to handle.
Kelly
Heading out into the sunshine to clean up the limbs our last winter storm broke.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@J R in WV: I wouldn’t recommend a camera without RAW capability. If you want to do processing or even want it as an option in the future, RAW is a necessity. Most folk do not need a full frame DSLR, they’re big and heavy(as are the lens); a micro 4/3’s or a APS-C camera will do fine. I shoot with APS-C cameras and the one thing I really love about mine is the ISO invariance(you get the same result bumping the ISO in camera as you do bumping up the exposure in post). The only reason that I’d even think of getting a full frame camera(well there’s the whole cost thing…) is for my Astro work, the larger sensor makes a big difference there.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@eemom: I’m with you on not knowing these people. Maybe now knowing them should be a source of pride?
Baud
@Dorothy A. Winsor: When Candace Owens was mentioned by the NZ shooter, I spent too much time wondering why the Murphy Brown reboot affected this guy so much.
schrodingers_cat
Beautiful Sufi devotional composed by A. R. Rahman and sung by Kailash Kher and Javed Ali, written by Prasoon Joshi from Delhi 6. Filmed during the Friday prayer at the historic Jama Masjid built by Shah Jahan who also built the Taj.
Arziyaan (requests)
West of the Rockies
@Baud:
Take ’em to next year’s CPAC. Those babies will sell like hot cakes!
Raven
@Dorothy A. Winsor: It’s pretty common around here for people to go on and on about people I’ve never heard of. Wilmer comes to mind, as many times as people tell me who and why, I still no capisce.
eemom
@smintheus:
The fire chief said the company suffered millions and millions in damages. I hope they don’t get stiffed by their insurers.
JPL
@eemom: ugh
LuciaMia
ummm, crawdads….
trollhattan
@Kelly:
Here’s a vulture.
It’s a little easier when the birdie is large and close. ;-)
Olympus E-M1ii+300/4.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Wow. I hadn’t heard that.
I saw a rerun of the original on one of the nostalgia channels a while back. It did not hold up well. IMHO.
LuciaMia
The only Guiness brewery in the US is about a half hour from me, here in Maryland. St. Patricks Day weekend, thought it might be fun to visit it. Then, nah, probably not a good idea.
Mnemosyne
@FlipYrWhig:
I would love to ask them who’s more responsible for the Iraq War, Chelsea Clinton or John Bolton?
But I’m pretty sure they have no clue who Bolton is.
Baud
@West of the Rockies: But then I’d have to be at CPAC.
West of the Rockies
OT, but does anyone else find Bill Maher to be a smarmy, pretentious scold?
Baud
@West of the Rockies: Yes, but he’s that way on our side enough to get away with it. Like Jon Stewart on steroids.
schrodingers_cat
@West of the Rockies: Yes. Also Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins and many other professional atheists. And I say this as a pretty agnostic, non-observant non religious person myself.
Litlebritdifrnt
Okay so Twitler is slamming John McCain, the dead John McCain that is on twitter. The man literally has no shame. None.
JPL
Delaware’s First State Democratic Dinner is tonight and Biden is the featured guest. Rumors are that he might announce, but I just don’t think it’s a good look. Geez the dinner is from 5:00 to 7;30 and the jokes just write themselves.
schrodingers_cat
@Litlebritdifrnt: As my grandmother would say he has no sanskar, roughly translated upbringing or culture.
JPL
@Litlebritdifrnt: wtf is he watching now?
Google is helping China military but not the US.. What does that even mean?
JPL
@Litlebritdifrnt: Now he’s moved on to the yellow vests in France He’s mocking Macron’s environmental policies I guess. Either he’s having a breakdown, or something big is coming down from Mueller.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@West of the Rockies: Yes.
West of the Rockies
@schrodingers_cat:
Militant atheists (if that’s a thing) are a bit like militant vegans.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@JPL:
“Why can’t we have both.”
schrodingers_cat
@West of the Rockies: The ones I mentioned are all virulently anti-Islam too, some might say that their critiques border on being offensively racist.
Dorothy A. Winsor
Reports of active shooter at Mason Hall in Ann Arbor. I had all my grad classes in that bldg. It’s right on the Diag.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@JPL: Please be Fredo please be Fredo please be Fredo
indicted, that is
@West of the Rockies: if the word “smarmy” didn’t exist, it would have to be invented for Maher
CapnMubbers
@West of the Rockies: YES.
eemom
@West of the Rockies:
God yes.
@Baud:
Don’t think that’s fair to Stewart. I get that he was guilty of both sides-ism in later years, but he NEVER had the utterly obnoxious, please let me punch that smug-ass face in, persona that Maher does.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Dorothy A. Winsor: I really hope this is true,
According to his profile, he’s a local news anchor
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I know it’s like engaging in a discussion with a lying, delusional dining room table, but… what fucking lists does he think he’s talking about?
satby
My heart is breaking for fellow jackal Cliosfanboy. His original comment went into moderation, and by the time it came out, a lot of people missed it, but he could probably use some emotional support, as they had to say goodbye to a furkid for the second time in about 10 months.
M31
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
the made-up lists of made-up shit in Donald Trump’s useless putrifying brain
Brachiator
@West of the Rockies:
Smarmy, sometimes. Pretentious, not really.
Maher and U2s Bono look like Hugh Hefner’s illegitimate sons.
JPL
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I don’t know, because I’m still trying to decode the google tweet. How and why is google helping China and their military and not us. I know that they are following China’s laws to restrict information, but that’s a bad thing.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: It looks like that’s the case.
I wonder if Steve Garagiola is related to Joe Garagiola. I wouldn’t think that’s a common name.
M31
oops sorry about that — assumes brain not in evidence
The management would like to apologize for the error.
Litlebritdifrnt
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: The lists in his head, because in reality the US comes dead last in all lists on the Environment from air to water quality you name it.
schrodingers_cat
@eemom: I have to agree with you about Jon Stewart. He is not as obnoxious Bill Maher.
West of the Rockies
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Okay, here’s a gross analogy (you’ve been warned)…
Trump lies the way a toddler uses his nose as a snack dispenser. Can’t stop himself, will do while staring you in the eyes, will be put out if you call him on it, and just keeps on munching away.
JPL
@satby: That sucks. Thank you for linking to it, and all I can offer are internet hugs.
WaterGirl
@West of the Rockies: If you spell “scold” with p-r-i-c-k, then yes, my answer is yes.
SiubhanDuinne
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Does he truly not know that the Paris Accord is called that because it was signed in Paris, not because France is the sole beneficiary? Does he truly not know that the Yellow Vest Movement is primarily about economic inequality and is not focused on environment?
And yeah, what lists?
Jesus. I simply cannot with his ignorance, stupidity, and schoolyard taunting.
sukabi
@West of the Rockies: short and long answers. Yes.
rikyrah
If John Cole lived in the city, I am sure that this would happen to him.
This thread???
https://twitter.com/jpbrammer/status/1106974178203320322
SiubhanDuinne
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
His son:
smintheus
@West of the Rockies: Except that there is a right and wrong answer to the question “Do any mortals actually know anything about the divine?”
SiubhanDuinne
@satby:
Such sadness. A lot of that around here recently.
satby
@JPL: I just felt so bad that after posting that it took quite a while (and a second post) before anyone knew and could respond. And by then they had left for the vet to say goodbye. But, no thread is ever dead here, so we can go back to this morning’s one.
BeautifulPlumage
Coworker’s dog was at the office yesterday but was experiencing stool issues. I found some samples in the prez’s office and sent him a photo. Then I noticed blood in a section so texted a close up photo. He just texted a pic of solid, healthy dog poop and I’ve never felt like more of a balloon juicer than today.
Ruckus
@Litlebritdifrnt:
He’s not too bright. I wonder if he knows the man is dead?
trollhattan
@rikyrah:
You are NOT kidding that is 100% Cole. :-)
Also a reminder why I will never, ever again live in an apartment if I can help it.
That shepherd has the biggest doggie bat-ears I’ve ever seen.
satby
@SiubhanDuinne: but we support each other, and that helps.
@BeautifulPlumage: too true. An incredibly full service blog.
Ruckus
@West of the Rockies:
Absolutely.
Barbara
@satby: Shucks. I am so sorry. It is so hard to lose a friend.
khead
@rikyrah:
Thanks. Really enjoyed that.
Barbara
@BeautifulPlumage: My vet told me once that dogs have a much shorter digestive cycle and so often have transient problems that clear up on their own when the rough stuff they are wont to eat clears the gut.
satby
I suspect the Wilmerbro I stopped interacting with at Zucker’s place signed me up to get campaign emails. Easy enough, I unsubcribed.
And then they asked why. Hilarity (for me) ensued. With a side of venom.
smintheus
@eemom: You’d think the manufacturers would anticipate a certain amount of rigor might come into play.
Ruckus
@SiubhanDuinne:
You are asking legitimate questions about a not quite elderly man with dementia. Which means that no, he doesn’t know any of the answers you seek. And besides that he was a stupid prick long before the dementia who would have said the same things because the world in his head and the one the rest of us live in are two entirely different places.
khead
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
This sounds like a tagline in a wireless commercial.
The Lodger
@smintheus: This conversation is appalling. Unbearable, even.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I wondered if this Weigel tweet meant Kauffman was one of the purity left’s boogeymen, but it looks more like he’s a purity argument for the Senator from MBNA, as was.
Gin & Tonic
@BeautifulPlumage: Am I the only person who finds the usage “texting a photo” jarring?
debbie
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Why do you hate dining room tables so much?
WaterGirl
@trollhattan: That is 100% Cole. So is this:
Someone on twitter posed the question: “If Donald Trump and Howard Schultz were both hanging from a cliff, who would you vote for in 2020?”
Cole replied: gravity
BeautifulPlumage
@Gin & Tonic: I find almost everything I do with this hand-held computer to be jarring! I remember Fotomats and having to wait a week to get prints back.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@WaterGirl:
It’s not just a good idea, it’s the Law.
BeautifulPlumage
@rikyrah: Thanks for sharing, hilarious! The prez’s main dog (versus the 2 smaller, backup dogs) opens doors, too. Hard to keep her in one place when she gets to come to work. : )
chris
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
WaterGirl
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Heh.
RAVEN
@Gin & Tonic: The princess told be to get a bag of the mushroom mulch like the one next to the tree. When I looked at it it wasn’t mushroom mulch it was compost. She was upstairs sewing so I texted her a picture of it. We do it all the time. I also take pictures of stuff before I take it apart, it’s a lot easier to put it back correctly when you have a picture.
SiubhanDuinne
@Litlebritdifrnt:
He holds on to old grudges like they’re superglued to his tiny hands.
SiubhanDuinne
@rikyrah:
That is hilarious, and totally Cole! I love the way the cat just waltzed in, chill as can be.
Like. A. Boss.
eemom
@smintheus:
That’s true. There’s always gonna be deep digging when there’s money to be urned.
@The Lodger:
You are quite right. We should not be joking over a situation this grave.
Gin & Tonic
@RAVEN: I know people do it. I do it. But it’s a photo, it’s not a text message. A text message is text.
Yes, dammit, this *is* a hill to die on.
mrmoshpotato
@SiubhanDuinne:
So now we’re to Racist Soviet Shitpile Grandpa argues with the dead on the Internet?
Wonderful! ?
Gin & Tonic
@eemom: Not going to join in the puns, but years and years ago when I lived in Cambridge a plastics factory or warehouse caught fire and burned out of control for quite some time, filling the neighborhood with the acrid fumes of burning plastic. At that time the fire department I don’t think was that well equipped, so they just shot water at it. This was in February. The sidewalks ended up coated with an exciting mix of ice and melted plastic. I have no idea how they cleaned that up when things finally thawed.
J R in WV
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
You do far more post-processing than I do, more ambitious. I adjust contrast and brightness, sometimes attempt to lessen haze or adjust color imbalance, but you are deep into dealing with the intricacies of Photoshop. I don’t use Adobe tools, as they don’t run on my OS.
I just did load a tool to deal with RAW images, and have my camera set to save both JPG and RAW versions, as well as bracket exposures, so I wind up with a ton of data from any random shoot. I wish I had better processing skills even with the tools I use, GIMP mostly, which is capable, but I’m just not that familiar with the depths of it.
chris
@Gin & Tonic: You’ll have to wait, the casket factory burned down.
WaterGirl
@Gin & Tonic: Sorry, but you text a photo through your texting app. If you send the photo by email, you email the photo. If you put the photo in an envelope and put a stamp on it, you mail the photo.
Jay
@West of the Rockies:
Candince Owens, Jordan Peterson and many many others act as a gateway drug for “conservatives” to spiral down into being Nazi mass shooters.
https://sullyville.substack.com/p/pigs-a-million-different-ones?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=copy
And the Social Media Companies enable them, while deplatforming those who call the Media Companies out on their inaction.
Ruckus
@WaterGirl:
He knows this. He’s just being extremely pedantic.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
so weird to be a 51 YO pragmatic, phlegmatic, old political fart, Wilmer-hater and AOC skeptic and be referred to as part of the “new left”.
Matt McIrvin
@Betty Cracker: Progressive Twitter is currently murdering itself over the Chelsea Clinton thing and it’s so convoluted and arcane that I can’t even follow which side any given person is on half of the time. It’s a fine controversy to stay well away from, I think.
eemom
@WaterGirl:
Yeah. Fer fuxsake, I’m a thousand year old woman whose kids make endless fun of my technological cluelessness, and even *I* know that.
neldob
Down here in So Cal we are having what they call a super bloom, lotsa rain after 5 or 6 year drought. Not only are the flowers flabbergastingly many and lovely, I saw a roadrunner and 2! California Bluebirds, along with an efflorescence of butterflies (Painted Ladies). Course this is just the intro to several months of flies galore, but I am enjoying it.
Gin & Tonic
@Ruckus: Pedantic, perhaps, but “extremely”? No. An app such as, for instance iMessage, is a messaging app, not a texting app. There are actual technical differences between SMS and MMS, and it just grates on my ears when people use “texting” as a verb to describe sending a message that is not text.
I recognize I am in the minority here.
dww44
@neldob: Sounds lovely. Both the flowers and the birds and butterflies. Would love to see pics!
tybee
@WaterGirl: one “sends” a photo, regardless of the technology involved.
WaterGirl
@Gin & Tonic: So you think that “I messaged a photo” is better?
My pet peeve from very long ago was when people would use “modem” as a verb. I heard someone on a TV show say “I modemed (something to someone).
Maybe it was that god-awful CSI: Cyber. Possibly the worst show ever on TV.
Gin & Tonic
@WaterGirl: What’s wrong with “sent”?
Ruckus
@Gin & Tonic:
Extremely pedantic. Yeah I thought the extremely was unnecessary but you might appreciate the irony, given the circumstances. Maybe not.
On the other hand, why do you care? We use words wrong every day. Especially words concerning tech. SSD for example. there’s no disc but that’s what it’s called.
David Evans
@Litlebritdifrnt: I would be surprised if the US were dead last on everything. The former Soviet Union has a terrible record. Look at the Aral Sea (what’s left of it) for one example. Their disasters often go unnoticed in the Western media.
brantl
That’s a crayfish, one of the claws is sticking out of the front of the bird’s beak. Zoom in, you can see it.